WHAT IF: The Girl in the Green Cloak
by pantiara
Summary: What if Gambit, Rogue, and Wolverine had met in a bar in nowhere, Canada? One shot. Minor edits


Damn, he hated the cold.

Remy LeBeau, aka Gambit, aka Le Diable Blanc, aka a slew of other names he'd been called by friends, enemies, and myriad lovers, turned up the heat on his old Caddy as far as it would go. The obscene amounts of salt on the roads during Canadian winters would be the death of his beloved car sooner or later. However, the payout on these annual trips was worth the rust and gas money. He was saving up for a brand new Corvette. This year just might cover it if he didn't blow it on hookers again.

Dreading stepping out of the warm car and into the cold twilight air, he sat a while and let the windows fog up. Outside, the cars and trucks and semis pulled into the parking lot of the tiny country dive bar, the only business in the miniscule podunk town, if it could even be called that. The man he'd been waiting for would be here soon.

He'd followed Logan, aka the Wolverine, from town to town, bar to bar, fight to fight for nearly three winters. His territory was large and clearly defined, just like the animal he was named after. He was easy to follow, because he feared nothing, also like his namesake. Remy kept his distance just to be safe.

Putting on his sunglasses, not to keep the sun out, but to shield his eyes from people who stared at them because they were black and red, he watched the slow descent of the sun past the tops of the dense pine forest surrounding the bar. A buzzard flew in lazy circles above the treeline. Remy contemplated how similar he and that buzzard were, waiting, tracking their prey, cashing in on its misery, and leaving full.

He wondered if buzzards felt guilty sometimes.

He had known Logan personally, a long time ago. Fifteen years to be exact. He had met him in his hometown of New Orleans. Though they were both mutants, they hadn't exactly made a good first impression on each other. That changed when Logan explained he was after a man who had gotten Remy thrown in some government experimentation facility when he was hardly a teenager. Like they say, an enemy of an enemy is a friend, and he obliged to bring him to the god forsaken place, help find him, and possibly free whatever poor souls were left inside.

After a hell of a fight with an ugly son of a bitch, Remy caught up to Logan outside the facility, relieved to see he was still alive. Remy left him for five minutes to make sure the current prisoners had been rescued without incident. He heard a gunshot outside, metal against metal, and hurried back.

The Logan he'd made friends with was gone, and in his place stood the same man with no memory of Remy, who didn't know his own name. He must have taken a bullet to the head and healed within twenty seconds, but had no memory of even that.

All he could do at the time was to take the newly nameless man to a hospital. He took him to Logan's home country of Canada; it would be easier, he thought, for them to find records of his existence there. Maybe the familiar landscape would jog his memory, too.

The drive north was one Remy would never forget, ironically. Logan stared out the window at the grey forest fog as bleak and clouded as his own mind. Every ten or twenty minutes, a vague look of panic would cross his face, like an old man with Alzheimer's waking up in the wrong bed.

He would look at Remy and ask some variation of, "Who are you? Where are you taking me? Who am I?"

Remy answered calmly every time, trying to mask exasperation and heartbreak, "My name is Remy. Your name is Logan. I'm taking you to the hospital because you can't remember anything."

"Why not?"

He shook his head. He'd given up trying to explain it to him for another round of amnesia to wipe it away. "I don't know."

His panic would subside slowly back to misty confusion, and he'd occasionally notice the military dog tag stamped WOLVERINE hanging by a chain on his neck, but the cycle began again, over and over, until he fell asleep.

Ten years after dropping him off at the hospital, Remy still couldn't shake the guilt of leaving him there, without a friend or family, if he even had any to start out with. He decided to take on the needle-in-a-haystack task of finding him and… apologizing? Catching up? Inviting him to New Orleans for lunch? He wasn't even sure by the time he crossed the border what he could do that would make any difference, but he couldn't let the guilt eat him up anymore.

He'd checked the hospital he'd brought him to. Sorry, past records were confidential, they said, and nobody would have remembered him anyway, it was so long ago. He asked around the homeless shelters for a man with no last name, or no name at all, about yea high, muscular, dark hair, unexplainable ability to heal quickly, metal skeleton? No luck.

As Remy waited at a bar, about to give up and go home, lo and behold Logan, the Wolverine, stepped into the bar's makeshift boxing ring about to fight someone twice his size. Most of the patrons made heavy bets against him. He was the kind of guy no one talked to, the kind of guy people loved to hate, even if he won. And he won every round without a scratch. Remy's vote of confidence won him $3,000 Canadian that night, and being ever the opportunist, he couldn't resist a chance to get rich. That $3,000 was enough for him for now, but the plan formed in his head for a few years before he made it an annual pilgrimage. His sense of guilt was overwhelmed with an even stronger instinct of greed.

For three years, Remy carefully followed the Wolverine to most of his matches. He had narrowed his routine down to an art. He made sure not to bring attention to himself, to sit in the opposite corner, not look Logan in the eye. He even made sure to disguise himself, dress a little bit differently each time. The sunglasses were a must. To this day, Logan didn't recognize him, or even notice him.

He winced a bit, picking scabs on his repressed conscience. It would have been so easy. If he'd just told him the first time he saw him fight, none of it would be necessary. Now, the thought of letting him know who he was was like putting a band aid on a gaping wound that kept spreading. All the fights Logan would figure out he'd won a windfall from, the sneaking around he'd already done… he could live with guilt, as long as there was money to bandage the wound. He might not live long with an angry, confused, betrayed Wolverine.

He no longer wanted to jog Logan's memory. All he wanted was a new Corvette. And maybe a hooker.

The sun had gone below the treeline and set almost an hour before Logan's beat up camper pulled into the parking lot. Remy's Caddy was parked conveniently between two semis, well hidden. He calmly watched the Wolverine leave his car and perform his nightly ritual of smoking a large cigar down to a stub while glaring at nothing.

As soon as Logan sulked inside, Remy grabbed his disguise for the night; his favorite beige trenchcoat, not worth much in freezing temperatures, but it looked good on him nonetheless. He left his car and carefully made his way across the slick snow-packed gravel.

What he hadn't seen was the girl in the green cloak get out of the passenger's side of the semi to his right.

There was a big crowd tonight; easy pickings. About forty nomad truckers and blue collar regulars laughed and smoked and drank and yelled at the hockey game on TV. The cloud of smoke illuminated by buzzing fluorescent light did nothing for Remy except give him an intense craving for nicotine. He slid up to the bar, leaning casually on one elbow, and asked for whatever beer was expensive. The bartender gave him a local imperial ale. Good enough. He wasn't keen on beer most of the time, but didn't feel like getting too sloppy on liquor tonight.

A while passed as Remy sat in his usual corner opposite the Wolverine, the time punctuated only by the occasional uproar of a goal for one hockey team or the other. He feigned interest in the game. He'd been in so many Canadian bars he was starting to understand the rules of hockey just by osmosis.

It took him a half hour to drain his pint of ale. The call of the wild soon dialed Remy's number and he left his table to take a leak.

The girl in the green cloak, who had been watching him intently as soon as he'd leaned across the bar, grabbed the bartender's attention.

When he returned, he was surprised to see that alongside his empty mug was a full glass of-

"Bourbon," said the girl in the cloak. She stood, her gloved hands crossed in front of her. She was as pale and unnaturally perfect as a porcelain doll, the most beautiful thing Remy had ever seen.

He couldn't speak. He couldn't move. There was not a single damned thing he could do, but exclaim _Mercy!_ as loud as he could in his thoughts. Those brown doe eyes stared through his sunglasses, into the back of him like a knowing preacher, searching for his soul to save. He feared she would find it, this girl with big pouting lips and a wisp of hair under the hood of her big green cloak, a complete stranger who knew him better than anyone, and had only said one word. He was certain she was bewitching him somehow. He had had his share of beautiful women, supermodel, 10-out-of-10 quality women, and he was the last person he thought would be prone to love at first sight. Despite himself, he couldn't pull away from those eyes, no matter how hard he tried. He forced his gaze back to the bourbon, afraid she could somehow read his thoughts. He sat slowly.

"This ain't a good time, _cher'_. I appreciate the offer 'n' all."

Pathetic. All the same, he couldn't risk a casanova act in a bar not on his own turf. Too many interested girls acted like they saw a ghost when he took off his sunglasses. He couldn't assume just because this particular beauty knew his favorite drink that she wouldn't do the same.

The girl, who had apparently been holding her breath in anticipation, let it out all at once, disappointed. She looked away, brushed her hair behind her ear with an elegantly gloved hand.

"Oh," she breathed. "Sorry, I just thought… you looked lonely…" She looked at the floor and swallowed. Her deepening sadness radiated just as piercingly into him as her gentle offer. He couldn't help but notice now how young she looked. Couldn't have even been old enough to drink, even in Canada. And her voice was familiar, definitely not from the area.

She turned away to sit back down at the bar. Her cloak fluttered in the harsh fluorescence.

"I am," he blurted. "Lonely, I mean." He offered her a chair. "Here, sit."

Her sadness melted as she took it. She smiled at him, still searching, trusting and unsure at once. She removed the hood of her cloak to reveal waves of brown hair.  
"You're not from around here, are you?" she asked, stealing the thought from his lips. Maybe she could read minds. He wouldn't be surprised, with everything he'd seen.  
"Neither are you," he countered.

"Meridian, Mississippi," she admitted.

He shook his head in disbelief. "What a small world! You come up halfway 'cross the American continent and find someone nearly from your own backyard."

"You're Cajun, aren't you?" she guessed excitedly. "I thought so!"

Her beam was infectious. He couldn't help but beam back at her.

"I pass as Quebecois up here," he lied.

"No way."  
"_Oui!_ Out here in the sticks, at least. None o' them Alberta farmboys can tell the difference." He chuckled and hoped he hadn't said that too loudly, as he was surrounded by large, drunken men who were most likely from Alberta. They were distracted by the coming fight and their own bawdy conversations.

"How old are you? You look awful young to be wanderin' around on cross country trips alone."

"Sixteen."

"Sixteen?" he couldn't help blurting. He nodded toward the other side of the room, indicating the bartender. "He let you buy me a drink?"

"Yeah, well, I've been here drinking water, so I guess he didn't mind that I spent some money. He said he didn't care as long as I didn't drink it myself." The barman must have felt his ears itch, because he stared across the room at them for a moment while cleaning a table. They hardly noticed.

She fingered the edge of her glass of water. "So, what are you doing here, anyway?"

"You first, _cherie_." He took big sips of his bourbon as he waited for her answer.

She looked down, ashamed. "I ran away from home."

He stopped drinking.

"What for?" She didn't answer and tried to avert her gaze from his sunglass eyes. "Your daddy beat you?" he ventured. "Abusive boyfriend?"

She looked up at the ceiling and hugged herself tight under her oversized cloak. He knew for sure he'd answered right; she was holding back tears.

"I'm sorry, _ma cherie_." He held out his own gloved hand, offering it to her for comfort. She didn't take it. She shook her head and let out a tense breath.

"No. I think I might have killed him."

He blinked. Not removing his hand, he tried to remain as casual as possible. Of course she was too good to be true, she looked too pure, too innocent…

"Oh?" he replied weakly.

She backtracked hurriedly, "I mean, he's in a coma, but I don't know if he's ever going to come out of it and-"

He fished her hand out from under her cloak and squeezed it quickly, confidently, to keep her from bursting into tears and attracting unwanted attention. In the calmest voice he could manage, he said, "It's all right, sugar, I won't tell anyone. What happened?"

She took her hand from his and worriedly picked at her opera gloves. "I just touched him," she nearly whispered, "That's all. I kissed him, and then the veins on his neck and face stood out and he had a seizure." She stared through the floor at nothing. He could tell she could see him again writhing on the floor in her memory.

"How do you know it was you that did it? Maybe he was an epileptic?"

"It _was _from me. I felt it happen. I don't know."

"It was an accident, then?"

"Of course it was an accident," she breathed, humiliated. She looked as if she might get up and walk out right then and there. "They took him to the hospital and I ran away."

Remy was slightly relieved. An odd, guilt ridden child, but not a murderer. As far as he knew.

"What's really weird though," she began again, slowly taking off her gloves one finger at a time, "is that I… absorbed part of him. Some of his memories."

"Memories?"

"Yeah." Her left glove was off. She stared at the palm of her naked hand. "Of his first girlfriend, HIS first kiss. She was prettier than me and it made me jealous." She chuckled nervously. "That's stupid, isn't it?"

He said nothing, contemplating his glass. He should have realized it the moment she described what she'd done. She was like him, and like Wolverine in the corner, getting ready to beat someone senseless, except she only needed the faintest touch to get the same results.

Taking his silence as rejection, tears began to flow down her cheeks and into her open palm.

He took her ungloved hand between both of his, two pieces of leather shielding him from a trip to the ER. He brought her hand as close to his face as he thought was safe. It was freezing cold. He blew into his cupped palms to warm her, her skin only a few millimeters from his lips.

She attempted the slightest tug to keep their skin from touching. She couldn't tell, but he was looking into her as he did, trying to read her soul like she had read his. All he saw were dark brown eyes swimming in light and pinkish-white corneas fresh from tears. All he had ever wanted waited, untouched, unfathomed, in the pitch black of her pupils. He swore he could feel her heart beating through her hand and into his.

Maybe just the slightest brush of skin wouldn't hurt.

He slowly lowered her hand, brought the back of it to his lips.

"Stop!" she gasped, and pulled away. A few of the patrons looked over at their table, then back to their drinks.

Jolted back into reality, he attempted to save face, like a cat pretending it hadn't just fallen off of something. "I'm sorry," he apologized. "That was… inappropriate. Completely." _Sixteen, Remy,_ he reminded himself. _Sixteen and she could kill you without meaning to._ That should have been a better deterrent than just her age, but wasn't, for some reason.

She drained the water from her glass and looked away from him.

A few awkward seconds passed. Now, he thought, while he was wallowing in embarrassment, would be as good a time as any to reveal to her who he really was.

He leaned forward, putting his hands almost under the table. He took off both of his winter gloves. A playing card appeared out of thin air between his fingers; just a magic trick, not part of his power.

"Look,_ cherie_," he whispered.

As she stared in wonder, the card began to glow an ethereal reddish pink. It emitted just the slightest whining buzz, like the far off sound of a hyperactive bee colony. An otherworldly flame grew around the edges, then to the middle of the card, until the entire thing was consumed with pink fire that didn't burn.

"If I let go of this card," explained Remy, "it would blow up whatever it touched." He effortlessly allowed the pink glow to dissipate safely back into his fingertips. With the slightest flourish the card was gone as well. "Sometimes I can get it to slice through stuff, if I throw it just right."

"You… you have powers too?"

He smiled, lowering his sunglasses. "You bet."

He let her stare into his eyes, crimson red irises ringed with black corneas, for what felt like decades. She looked into them, enthralled.

"I can't believe it."

"There are stranger things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio…" he paused. "I forgot the rest. But ol' Billy Shakespeare was right."

He felt as if a weight had been lifted off his shoulders. A girl who wasn't scared of him for who he was, whom he didn't have to explain his abilities to inside and out, whom he didn't have to assure that his power wasn't contagious, that he wouldn't hurt her with it. He found someone like him.

He knew lust alone wasn't supposed to make you feel quite this lightheaded and idiotic. Maybe he'd had too much to drink already.

From the table next to theirs, a burly hunter and his friend abandoned their beers and got up to join the crush of people beginning to form around the caged ring. Remy had nearly forgotten about the fight about to take place.

Logan, the Wolverine, had left his table in the corner and moved to the corner of the ring, now poised and ready for anyone stupid enough to challenge him. He cracked his neck and Remy heard it across the room above the scorn of the mob.

As the referee introduced him, the girl asked, "You never told me why _you're_ all the way up here."

"For him,_ cherie_." He pointed at Logan, cracking his knuckles, being heckled and booed mercilessly by the crowd.

"You know him? Are you his manager or something?"

He laughed, "Naw, just his biggest fan!"

The ref asked the cajoling mob for a volunteer to fight against the Wolverine. A challenger appeared immediately, bald, tattooed, mean, and about the same size, with a bigger gut. The crowd cheered.

This idiot didn't stand a chance, Remy knew, but he tried to keep the thought of all the money he was about to win out of his expression. It was delicate as a poker game, and if the wrong person figured out he was bluffing, he could lose more than a wad of cash.

A weasely unofficial bookie came around to take bets from the assembled rowdy truckers. Every one of them bet on the poor sap who'd just put himself into the ring. The Wolverine attracted hate like iron to a magnet, and they didn't even know what he really was. The bookie neared his table.

"How much on the challenger?" asked the bookie. Remy waved five crisp, Canadian, 100 dollar bills.

"Put it on the Wolverine," he said.

The bookie smirked. "You'll lose it tonight, that's for sure, guy." He put him down for $500 for the Wolverine. The odds were 20 to 1 against him. Fantastic odds.

The referee announced the sparse rules against the din of the drunken truckers. This particular ref must have known Logan well, because he heard him mutter something to the new guy about not hitting him in the balls.

"You really think he'll win?" asked the girl innocently.

"He'll win." He gave her a knowing wink.

"Does he cheat?"

"Oh no, _petit_. Unless you think of natural ability as cheatin'."

The ref got the hell out of the way to begin the match. The first few punches came from the newcomer, fast and fierce. The Wolverine took all of them straight to the face without dodging. Remy was patient. He wasn't mad enough to put up a fight yet, but he would. The only time Logan lost was when the other guy had enough brains not to hit him where the sun didn't shine. These kinds of matches being no holds barred, they usually couldn't resist the challenge. The bald guy seemed to knock Logan senseless and into the corner, then hit him below the belt, right on cue.

Remy put a foot on the table and couldn't help but laugh a bit, drunk with alcohol and confidence. It was over now.

It took about ten punches for the Wolverine to KO the challenger, much to the chagrin of the patrons. The girl flinched at every hit, by the end shielding her eyes away from the gruesome sight. He could have figured she'd never seen a real live boxing match before. He put an arm around her for comfort. His head close to hers, the stink of cigarettes and stale beer overpowered by her shampoo, made him lose his train of thought again for a moment, until she flinched again. It _was _rather unsettling, he thought, like watching Sly Stallone pummel a side of meat into hamburger, if the meat was so fresh it was still alive.

After the match, the challenger's skinhead looking buddies had to drag what was left of him out of the ring and give him copious amounts of alcohol to get him to stop moaning in pain. Logan sat at the bar and ordered a beer, no worse off than before he stepped in the ring.

The weasley bookie, giving Remy the evil eye, doled out his winnings to him; nearly 7 grand, the most he'd ever won from a single match.

"Congratulations," he remarked snidely, then slunk off to chat with the bartender.

Most of the barflies and truckers, now broke, left the bar muttering angrily to themselves, eventually leaving only Remy, the girl, the lump of hamburger and his friends, Logan, the bartender, and the bookie.

He realized he still had his arm around her. He wanted more than anything to bury his face in her neck and never leave. How drunk and crazy he had to be to forget that he just won $7,000, he wasn't sure, but he'd somehow gotten there.

"How did you know?" she asked a little too loudly in the newly quiet bar for his comfort. He snapped out of it and removed his foot from the table and his arm from her shoulder.

He shrugged. "Educated guess, _cher_'. He's good."

A thought dawned on him like a metric ton of manure dropped on his head. _"Mon dieu, petit_, we been carryin' on this whole time and I didn't even have the good manners to ask your name!"

"Marie," she said. "Or Rogue. I like Rogue better."

"I like Marie. It's a good French name, _no_?"

She smiled, "You can call me whatever you want."

He nodded an instinctively polite Southern greeting. "Remy LeBeau, _ma'moiselle_." He left it there, without his cadre of other colorful epithets.

From the other side of the room, one of the defeated boxer's friends came up to the bar to harass Logan. Sensing trouble, the bartender disappeared to the back room, leaving the bookie to witness the scene. Remy felt the tension in the air as well. He couldn't tell what the asshole was muttering, but it would be bad news for everyone involved if he pissed off the Wolverine again.

Suddenly the bookie stood and made eye contact with Remy. He could hear his shrill voice above the others say, "Yeah, and that guy was the only one betting on him! I bet they got a ring going or something!" He pointed straight to him. The skinhead turned to glare at Remy and Marie.

Remy had the sudden urge to vomit. "_Merde_," he whispered.

He played it too fast and loose this time, bet too much, acted too confident, got too distracted. He knew he was going to pay the piper sooner or later, but he'd hoped he would have time to get a new car first. He reached into his pocket, held his pack of playing cards ready in case things got real. He said nothing as the man took a step towards them.

Marie just now seemed to understand what was happening. She looked to him with terror growing on her face. He stood slowly, prepared to guard her from him.

Just then, Logan's hand reached out and grabbed the skinhead by the collar, throwing him against the wall behind him. Two long metal blades extended from the first and third knuckles of his fist, just on either side of the man's bulging face. A third extended from the middle knuckle and stopped at the bridge of his nose, threatening, daring him to move. Out of nowhere, the barman reappeared with a shotgun at the ready, aimed point blank at Logan's head.

"Look out!" screamed Marie.

Almost without thinking, Remy retrieved a card in a flash, charged it, and threw it towards the bartender. It hit his mark perfectly, slicing clean through the magazine so that it couldn't fire, spilling buckshot all over the floor. It hit the wooden wall to the side of the barman and exploded, sending splinters into everyone on that side of the room.

The skinhead screamed in pain and covered his left eye, which had been hit with wood pulp and splinters. Logan let go of him and let him stumble to his other buddies and the ruined boxer. He and his whole gang ran or limped out the exit, shouting. A moment later and there was a clatter of gravel under tires, the deafening growl of a pickup truck engine that faded into the distance.

The bartender had been blown backwards. He laid on the floor, momentarily dazed but unharmed, holding the barrel of his gun in one hand and the trigger and stock in the other. He looked up at Logan, then to Remy, back at Logan. He stumbled and slipped across the buckshot to the back of the bar, searching for his phone.

The bookie simply shook uncontrollably. "Freaks," was the only word he could manage to say. On the TV, a newscaster spoke about the growing mutant threat.

Logan walked calmly but quickly out of the bar. Marie took off after him, Remy trailing behind.

In the cold, pure night air, Logan opened the door to his camper.

"Wait!" shouted Marie, panting puffs of condensation.

He kept his back to her but stopped, one boot on the rusted running board. He turned his head just slightly. Dumbstruck, she groped for the words to say as Remy caught up to her.

"You're like us," she said.

"So?" he asked.

"So…" she looked to Remy for direction. He gave none, his hands in his pockets, head pointed away. "so we could-"

Logan shut the door and turned to them. "There's no 'we,' kid," he said bluntly, his voice a deep growl. "Wherever I go, I go alone."

Remy's guilt flowed through his veins as densely as the adrenaline from the bar scuffle. Even though he could barely see a damned thing, he didn't take off his sunglasses. _Say something, you idiot_, he berated himself.

"He saved your life," she told Logan, indicating Remy. He groaned. Bless her heart, but she was a little too innocent for her own good.

"No he didn't," answered Logan glibly. He took a cigar from his jacket pocket and bit off the end. He approached Remy nonchalantly, without malice. Remy bit the bullet and took off his glasses, meeting Logan eye to eye. He looked at his red irises with mere curiosity. There was no sudden realization, no spark of a long lost memory springing into consciousness.

_Say something, damn it._

"Thanks," said Logan.

Remy stood, mute, for what felt like minutes. "For what?"

"For betting on me. Vote of confidence." His mouth curled slightly around the cigar between his lips. If Remy didn't know any better, he'd say he was smiling.

Billions of thoughts swirled around in his head, all trying to get out of his mouth at once. The only one that made it out was a feeble, "_Pas de quoi_. Don't mention it."

"Quebecois, eh? You from Montreal?"

"Yeah."

Marie gave him a contemptuous look.

Logan went back to his camper and opened the door with a squeak.

"You don't have to be alone," Marie suggested, a last ditch effort.

"I prefer it that way," he answered.

He paused one last time to look at them. "Take care of her," he instructed Remy as gently as his grizzled voice would allow. He shut his door, started the engine, and was gone along the forest highway, nothing left of him but the end of the cigar he'd spat out on the gravel.

Remy didn't know whether to feel relieved or sick to his stomach. The bottom line was that Logan still didn't remember him and was gone, and that the bartender probably called the mounties who would be there any minute.

"Why'd you tell him that?" asked Marie.

"Huh?"

"You let him think you were from Quebec."

He told her the truth, shaking his head helplessly. "I don't know why I do half of anything, _cherie_. I plan out the other half, and then everything goes to _merde_, and I have to wade through it to get to the other side."

"Like a house of cards that keeps falling over?"

"Exactly!"

He laughed because there was nothing else he could do. Sensing the uneasiness behind it, she took his arm in hers.

That precise moment would have been an excellent time for a long, lingering kiss, if she were two years older and not deadly to touch. He settled for a long, lingering hug instead. His face pressed against the hood of her cloak, with no sound but the rustle of wind through pine trees and muffled bass of country music still playing in the bar, he could have frozen solid and never been happier.

_Mounties,_ his brain reminded him. He let go of her.

"Um," she started, staring down at her feet, "I know it's a lot to ask of somebody I just met… I don't really have anywhere else to go..."

"Perish the thought, _mon petite_, you don't even have to ask. He tol' me to take care of you."

The apples of her cheeks flushed. She smiled with relief and exuberance. He opened the door of his Caddy for her like a gentleman.

As he started the car, Remy hoped Logan appreciated the present he'd slipped into his pocket. He felt it was quite literally the least he could do. Maybe next year he'd invite him to New Orleans for a drink.

* * *

The Wolverine sped north along the highway, quite a few kilometers over the speed limit. A pit of malaise was growing in his stomach, and he couldn't figure out why. He occasionally had bouts of deja vu that drove him insane. Every time, for him, could have been important; a piece of the puzzle from his past could be staring him in the face and he'd never know.

A fog formed in a valley as he drove through it.

He was no longer in his camper. He was in someone else's truck. He stared down at the dog tag stamped WOLVERINE hanging around his neck. A man drove the truck, though he couldn't see his face.

"Who are you?" he asked. "Where are we going? Who am I?"

"I'm Remy. Your name is Logan. I'm taking you to the hospital."

"Why?"

"You can't remember anything."  
"Why not? What happened?"

The man paused. "I don't know."

Logan stopped his camper on the side of the road. He sweated like a pig, freezing cold and burning like he'd caught a fever. He reached, shaking, into his pocket for another cigar and his lighter.

What he pulled out instead was a huge wad of $100 bills that weren't his.


End file.
